Weekly Savage Dungeon

[MomomiMomi]

So you like vote abandons and doing normal dungeons with your static because duty findering it is a crap shoot? Because that's what happens when you make basic content markedly harder. Did you like rath ex learning parties? That's what you are going to get with a hard dungeon. So every time you level, you are going to have a rath ex experience, i.e. it taking forever to fill, it disbanding due to wipes a lot, and maybe clearing after a full lockout if lucky.

I think you guys assume that hard means "still can beat in a single pull, but i don't fall asleep doing it." The idea that this content might actually be difficult to many people slips by you.

I think you missed the "progressively harder" part. Shinryu is actually a good example of the devs doing this. It's harder than content before it, but not so hard that people can't clear it. It encourages players to get better to be able to clear it. Thordan is a good example of the devs not doing it. That fight is a complete joke. Is it even possible to fail it?

[TaleraRistain]

I think you missed the "progressively harder" part. Shinryu is actually a good example of the devs doing this. It's harder than content before it, but not so hard that people can't clear it. It encourages players to get better to be able to clear it. Thordan is a good example of the devs not doing it. That fight is a complete joke. Is it even possible to fail it?

People were vote abandoning in swarms when Shinryu first came out and for a good amount of time afterward. I ran Trial Roulette every day and constantly saw it. I helped a lot of newbies through it, but not everyone is going to stick around like me. The only thing that scaling up the MSQ is going to do is drive off those who are only in the game for the MSQ. The optional content is there for the challenge.

As for the OP, I think it's a good idea. I wouldn't give it unique drop rewards, but a higher tomestone reward like MSQ Roulette or Alliance Roulette have would be a good incentive to run it.

[MomomiMomi]

People were vote abandoning in swarms when Shinryu first came out and for a good amount of time afterward. I ran Trial Roulette every day and constantly saw it. I helped a lot of newbies through it, but not everyone is going to stick around like me. The only thing that scaling up the MSQ is going to do is drive off those who are only in the game for the MSQ. The optional content is there for the challenge.

As for the OP, I think it's a good idea. I wouldn't give it unique drop rewards, but a higher tomestone reward like MSQ Roulette or Alliance Roulette have would be a good incentive to run it.

Strange, because I did it a lot and not a single vote abandon happened. A wipe or two and people ended up getting it.

[TaleraRistain]

Strange, because I did it a lot and not a single vote abandon happened.

You're on Primal. I'm on Aether. We also possibly play at vastly different times. People would take one look at what we got and take the penalty. And once one person does it, others can leave without the penalty.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

So you like vote abandons and doing normal dungeons with your static because duty findering it is a crap shoot? Because that's what happens when you make basic content markedly harder. Did you like rath ex learning parties? That's what you are going to get with a hard dungeon. So every time you level, you are going to have a rath ex experience, i.e. it taking forever to fill, it disbanding due to wipes a lot, and maybe clearing after a full lockout if lucky.

I think you guys assume that hard means "still can beat in a single pull, but i don't fall asleep doing it." The idea that this content might actually be difficult to many people slips by you.

You mean having dungeons where I have to turn my brain on and can't simply pull the entire room while the DPS spam AoE abilities? Yes. I will gladly take increased failure rates over what we have now. Of course, as per usual, you argue in extremes. Progressive difficulty doesn't mean everything becomes unbearable challenging, but simply scales upwards. A direct equivalent would be campaign modes in single player games where you go from Easy to Normal. If such a curve existed, you aren't going to a constant string of disbands because people will actually have to put forth an effort. When nothing challenges, people get complacent. The reason you see so many mess up Tsukiyomi normal is due to how laughably easy the game between the end of Stormblood up to 4.3. Then out of nowhere, you have an abrupt spike that people aren't expecting. That is FFXIV's issue in a nutshell. Constant, random, spikes of difficulty in lieu of a developed curve.

That's precisely what hard means. Why is that such a bad thing? Need I reiterate for probably the thousandth time now The Vault is a good example of difficulty done well. It isn't Rathalos EX level but it's not something you can sleep through. What a novel concept. If anyone finds Swallow's Compass hard, they are either woefully undergeared or haven't bothered to learn how to play the game. Players like this shouldn't be rewarded.

People were vote abandoning in swarms when Shinryu first came out and for a good amount of time afterward. I ran Trial Roulette every day and constantly saw it. I helped a lot of newbies through it, but not everyone is going to stick around like me. The only thing that scaling up the MSQ is going to do is drive off those who are only in the game for the MSQ. The optional content is there for the challenge.

As for the OP, I think it's a good idea. I wouldn't give it unique drop rewards, but a higher tomestone reward like MSQ Roulette or Alliance Roulette have would be a good incentive to run it.

Because the game is piss easy until Shinryu shows up. As I said, when you have sudden difficulty spikes like that, it will create a wall for people who weren't anticipating such a jump. On the other hand, if content grew progressively harder, Shinryu would feel like a natural step. Is it too much to ask casual content actually require two healers?

Even casual players are asking for more. We lost a dungeon because the developers outright admitted people have been finding them boring.

It doesn't. WoW already tried that. It doesn't matter if you do it progressively or not - at any difficulty point, there's someone who's gonna fall off, either because they simply hit their skill cap, or because they no longer find it fun and go play sth else. If it was any other way, we could slowly make the entire playerbase beyond Ultimate-ready just by taking perpetual baby steps upward. Good luck trying.

There needs to be a balance. If I recall, WoW swung too hard in the opposite direction which will turn just as many people off as making everything super easy. We've seen that first hand.

[RiyahArp]

I think you missed the "progressively harder" part.

Do you remember doing that fight new and at min ilvl? Lots of wipes, lots of vote abandons, and its really only tolerable due to massive gear creep. But of course, for everyone here it was one and done, and wasn't hard at all because apparently nothing in this game should be hard for anyone.

Do you really want more of the launch shin/tsuyu/math boss/hashmal experience? Or even harder than that?

In my ideal scenario it would be for groups of friends who want that particular challenge, not necessarily for "casual" players to repeatedly go in and disband instances because they can't keep up

yeah i was responding more to bournes idea that normal stuff should be harder. As for yours, it will end up two weeks and done, probably. Without two healers or tanks what they can do is limited. With the hard content we have, they tend use randomness to make it palatable. Rath charges you randomly, the difficulty of hoh is random enemy movement and placement, etc. A single tank can't really do much; they only have so many cooldowns and no one to tank swap with. A single healer can only heal so much. It would be a lot more fixed in potential.

You're on Primal. I'm on Aether. We also possibly play at vastly different times. People would take one look at what we got and take the penalty. And once one person does it, others can leave without the penalty.

eh im on primal too, it was never one and done. The times when four people would wipe on the first tidal wave were too common to be believed. There's this sort of forum bias that everything is easy, which I don't see in game and frustrates me when we try to talk about difficulty.

[MomomiMomi]

Do you remember doing that fight new and at min ilvl? Lots of wipes, lots of vote abandons, and its really only tolerable due to massive gear creep. But of course, for everyone here it was one and done, and wasn't hard at all because apparently nothing in this game should be hard for anyone.

Do you really want more of the launch shin/tsuyu/math boss/hashmal experience? Or even harder than that?

Progressively harder. Those experiences are pretty fun, and they push the player to become better. Part of the reason why players struggle with them is because they are rarely challenged. You can just faceroll dungeons. There's almost never any risk, especially if you're not making large pulls, which isn't even how they're designed to be played.

The problem, from my point of view, is that they're generally afraid to make the players fail in the majority of content. And when they suddenly decide to risk making players fail, the players aren't prepared for it.

By making dungeons as easy as they are, the players are only going to be worse when it comes to harder content. Training should start at the low end.

[whiskeybravo]

Without two healers or tanks what they can do is limited. With the hard content we have, they tend use randomness to make it palatable. Rath charges you randomly, the difficulty of hoh is random enemy movement and placement, etc. A single tank can't really do much; they only have so many cooldowns and no one to tank swap with. A single healer can only heal so much. It would be a lot more fixed in potential.

Oh dear, an instance where tanks might actually have to use tank stance :P

But seriously, fair enough points. Damage would have to be limited to what 1 tank/1 healer can handle, and mechanics could only be so "deep". Though I do think there are a number of mechanics that would work with 4 people as they do with 8. Invisible AoEs, debuffs that need to be passed, or things that need to be stood in or interacted with by certain party members at certain times. There are a few enemies that perform telegraphed attacks via their animations instead of the usual cast bar/indicator. But I do agree, it would probably be more limited than what we see in the 8/24 man raids. Maybe..

[RiyahArp]

Damage would have to be limited to what 1 tank/1 healer can handle, and mechanics could only be so "deep". Though I do think there are a number of mechanics that would work with 4 people as they do with 8.

They could, idk though. I mean, what would this solve that say doubling the amount of savage fights wouldn't? Maybe they should float up one as a trial for testing, as long as it isn't mandatory.

A direct equivalent would be campaign modes in single player games where you go from Easy to Normal. If such a curve existed, you aren't going to a constant string of disbands because people will actually have to put forth an effort.

..actually people put down games when the effort is too much. That's kind of why easy mode exists now, i think Deus EX Mankind Divided calls theirs "tell me a story," and easy modes specifically are for people who don't want that in games. And there's actually a decent amount of people who use them. Momo had the same argument, assuming that constantly progressing difficulty makes for a fun experience, but a lot of people actually put games down if the difficulty spikes enough or progresses enough. You can't really assume everyone will keep traveling down the road, because people have different requirements and needs.

[whiskeybravo]

They could, idk though. I mean, what would this solve that say doubling the amount of savage fights wouldn't? Maybe they should float up one as a trial for testing, as long as it isn't mandatory.

I wasn't really thinking of it as anything mandatory, just an extra weekly challenge to throw into the mix for those who'd be interested. Doubling the amount of savage fights would indeed add more challenging content, but I think that's a bit much for the purpose of this suggestion. You can already spend an ungodly amount of time trying to clear the savage turns each week, I wouldn't necessarily want to "double" the time spent raiding.

The other thing is like, until the raids are unlocked you are pretty much tied to raiding with your static group. I certainly have, over the years, wanted to "raid" people who are in my FC, but also they're in their own static, so it's impossible to really ever raid with them unless we happen to be progging the same content when the main group isn't. So having a separate challenge like this might do some good towards strengthening those types of bonds with your FC and LS mates